Review: “Silent Hill 3” (PC Version) (Computer Game)

A few days before I originally wrote this review, I was in a nostalgic mood. In particular, I was nostalgic about a game that I played on the Playstation 2 when I was about sixteen – the one and only “Silent Hill 3”. But, since my PS2 sadly no longer works, I realised that it would be best to re-play this game on the PC.

But, although I’d found a demo of the PC version of this game on the internet a few years ago, copies of the full version were slightly on the pricey side of things. Not only that, at the time of writing, the game seems to be on neither GOG nor Steam. The only way to get this game is on DVD.

This DVD to be precise. Still, it’s good not to have to wait ages to download game data.

So, when I noticed that a second-hand copy of the game was going for about £13 (plus postage) on Amazon, I decided to splash out on it. So, let’s take a look at the PC port of “Silent Hill 3”:
Before I go any further, I should warn you that this review may contain some mild SPOILERS and GRUESOME/DISTURBING IMAGES.

Even the game itself warns you about this!

“Silent Hill 3” is a survival horror game from 2003. Although it can theoretically be played on it’s own, it is a direct sequel to the first “Silent Hill” game and the game’s story will make more sense if you’ve played that game.

Anyway, “Silent Hill 3” begins with a teenage girl called Heather finding herself trapped inside a rusty old fairground filled with nightmarish monsters. As she tries to escape the fairground by climbing a rollercoaster track, she is promptly run over by a carriage.

Waking up in a cafe in her local shopping centre, Heather is relieved to discover that it was nothing more than a nightmare. But, since it is getting late, she calls her father and begins to walk home – when she is startled by a rather dishevelled and dodgy-looking man who wants to talk to her.

After running away and hiding in the bathroom, she climbs through a window into a nearby alleyway and prepares to go home – only to discover that the alleyway has been blocked!

Luckily, a backdoor to the shopping centre is still open. So, she goes through it – only to notice that the centre is completely deserted and slightly gloomier than usual. Still, after a bit of searching, she finds a shop that is still open.

Well, that was lucky! I’m sure there’s nothing horrible in HERE!

When Heather enters the shop, she finds an unearthly monster feasting upon a mysterious corpse. Shocked and horrified, she looks around for a weapon and finds a mysterious pistol lying on the floor. Picking it up, she kills the creature and begins to explore the rest of the shopping centre. But, something isn’t right….

Oh right! This is a “Silent Hill” game! How could I forget?

One of the first things that I will say about “Silent Hill 3” is that it is a lot scarier than I remember! It could be because I’m less familiar with the horror genre than I used to be, or because I was playing it on the PC with headphones (rather than on a tiny TV screen) or even because I’m not comparing it to “Silent Hill 2“. But, this game is scary! It is a game that will make your heart pound at a hundred miles an hour and it will make you feel slightly jumpy for a while after you’ve finished playing.

The game’s horror works on so many levels. Not only is Heather a somewhat vulnerable character who has limited weapons, but the game has a uniquely dark and creepy atmosphere.

And this is one of the “safer” areas in the game!

Add to this all of the symbolism inherent in the monster design (more on that later), the game’s pacing, the sheer sense of bleakness throughout the game, the claustrophobic camera angles, an utterly terrifying soundtrack, some grisly location designs, some disturbing set pieces and a few well-placed jump scares and this is the kind of game that will leave you feeling at least mildly traumatised after you’ve played it.

But, the game’s main source of horror is probably suspense. A lot of the game will be spent nervously exploring dark buildings (and methodically checking everything in sight), with the camera carefully positioned to ensure that you never quite see everything around you at any one moment.

Not only that, when there’s a monster in the general vicinity, the game’s soundtrack changes slightly (with the creepy music varying depending on the monsters). So, you know that something is there, but you don’t know where.

The game’s monsters are all suitably disturbing too. A lot of this has to do with the symbolism inherent in the monster design. Many of the monster designs revolve around the theme of disease – such as undead nurses, mosquito-like creatures, bandage-covered zombie dogs, giant tumour monsters etc..

This is pretty creepy in and of itself. But, more than this, at least a couple of the monsters in the game also have a somewhat phallic appearance – which adds an extra level of disturbing symbolism to the game.

Another thing that makes the monsters scarier is that you can’t fight them all. Not only does the game carefully ration the amount of ammunition it gives you, but even the game’s array of melee weapons aren’t that powerful (and you’ll probably end up getting hurt if you use them).

Since Heather isn’t a soldier or an action hero, the combat in the game reflects this fact by deliberately being slightly clunky and imprecise. So, expect to flee in terror more often than you draw your gun.

And, this emphasis on fleeing in terror is one reason why the classic “Silent Hill” games are scarier than the classic “Resident Evil” games are.

Unlike the open-world design of the previous two “Silent Hill” games, Silent Hill 3 has more of a level-based structure. However, since the levels themselves are non-linear areas that require exploration and puzzle-solving, this change doesn’t feel too limiting.

Not only that, this structure also helps to keep the game slightly more focused too. Even so, you do get to explore the town of Silent Hill a little bit in one later part of the game.

Ah, ominous fog! I’ve missed you! 🙂

The game’s puzzles are also reasonably sensible too – and they never quite reach “point and click game” levels of randomness (although they occasionally come close).

Best of all – if, like me, you’re terrible at puzzles – then the game even has separate difficulty settings for combat and puzzles. For the most part, I was able to solve the puzzles on my own – although I had to consult a walkthrough about five times whilst playing.

In terms of the lighting and location design, this game is magnificent! In addition to wonderfully gloomy lighting that is shadowy enough to be ominous, without being too dark to see anything – the game’s location designs are exquisitely creepy. As you would expect from a “Silent Hill” game, many of the locations appear in both a “normal” form and a dark, rusty, nightmarish, diseased and grisly “otherworld” form.

This is probably one of the least disturbing parts of the “otherworld”.

Plus, in addition to lots of nightmarish interior design, there are beautiful paintings too!

As always, this is absolutely terrifying. Not only that, like in previous “Silent Hill” games, even the “normal” versions of various locations will still feature creepy background details in order to ensure that there is little respite from the game’s unnerving terror.

For example, this place has seen better days!

One particularly outstanding location in this game is the “Boreley Haunted Mansion”. This is a carnival ghost house with a bit of a macabre twist to it, and a Vincent Price-style narrator who manages to be both hilarious and terrifying at the same time. Seriously, this small segment of the game is a perfect blend of old-school horror and more modern horror. However, it is followed by a somewhat frustrating running-based segment (but, more on that later).

Seriously, it’s only a small part of the game but it is brilliant! It’s classic 1950s-style horror with a grisly modern twist!

Although I don’t want to spoil the game’s story too much, I will point out that this game is a direct sequel to the original “Silent Hill”. But, the themes from that game are explored in a slightly different – and creepier way – with more emphasis on the horrors of religious fanaticism, more emphasis on the series’ backstory and a darkly memorable scene featuring a character from the first game.

On the plus side, there are some cool little references to the first two games, like this “Silent Hill 1”-style notebook.

The game’s writing and voice-acting is fairly good. Although some of the dialogue is a little bit on the melodramatic side, this works well with some of the game’s creepier characters (Vincent and Claudia spring to mind). However, some of the in-game text is slightly clunky – but in an endearing way. The voice-acting is surprisingly good too, with no glaring examples of “bad voice acting” or anything like that.

And, yes, the conversations with Claudia can be ridiculously melodramatic!

In terms of the controls, the PC port allows you to configure them to your own liking. Plus, it also contains two alternative movement schemes, with the “2D” option being very similar to the movement scheme in the classic “Resident Evil” games.

Yes, the movement in this game can take a bit of getting used to if you’ve never played a survival horror game before – but the slightly unwieldly controls and unusual camera angles are designed to impart a feeling of vulnerability and confusion. Most of the time, this works really well – although it is annoying as hell when you have to outrun a cloud of mist through a series of narrow corridors at one point in the game.

Seriously, it took me about seven attempts to get past this part of the game!

Best of all, the PC port of this game also includes a proper saving system. Although the save points from the original Playstation 2 version of the game are still there, the people behind this port have realised that this is a computer game and, in a good computer game, you can save (almost) anywhere. Seriously, this tiny change makes the game so much better!

Ha! I don’t need YOU any more, save point! You’re nothing more than a source of mood lighting now!

Another cool feature of this game is that, after you complete it, an “Extra New Game” mode is unlocked (which, depending on how well you play the game, can include extra weapons).

In addition to this, completing the game also unlocks an option to enter codes that allow you to unlock an array of alternate costumes – some of these codes can be found in-game, but there are also lists on the internet. Surprisingly though, some of the codes from the PS2 version (eg: the OPS2 magazine T-shirt code etc..) don’t seem to work in the PC version. Plus, you can also unlock an extra options menu that allows you to do things like change the blood colour, give yourself extra ammo etc.. So, this game has at least a slight amount of replay value.

Finally, I should probably mention the game’s amazing soundtrack. As I mentioned earlier, the game will play a different piece of disturbing music depending on which monsters happen to be nearby (eg: when zombie dogs are nearby, the music will include howling. When giant mosquitos are nearby, the music will include buzzing etc..).

This in-game music is, in a word, terrifying. It is also beautifully counterpointed with some hauntingly relaxing acoustic music during a number of cutscenes too. Seriously, the soundtrack in this game is an integral part of what makes “Silent Hill 3” so incredibly creepy!

All in all, this is pretty much a perfect horror game! Yes, there are a couple of slightly frustrating segments but the game is overwhelmingly brilliant. Best of all, the PC port is surprisingly well-made and runs really well on an ancient computer like mine, although I don’t know how it would handle on more modern PCs. Yes, this game is a little bit difficult to find these days – but it is well worth doing so! Just remember, don’t play it at night!

If I had to give it a rating out of five, it would get six hundred and sixty six.